I'm having a problem with my elderly mother.  Her financial situation is somewhat precarious, though not an emergency situation.  She is currently unable to make decisions for herself due to willful ignorance on financial matters.  She prefers to shop her bad ideas around to the four or five advisors she has and find somebody to cosign this crap.

She has refused to so much as pull out a calculator and figure out how much any given investment will make for her or how much it would cost to switch from one thing to another.  She doesn't necessarily trust my judgement or anyone else's, and yet refuses to take responsibility for her own decisions and refuses to educate herself on financial matters.

I'd like to make sure she stays solvent and indoors and fed.  

Any of you guys running into the same situation?  How do you handle it, what do you do?  If you are not a decision maker for an elderly parent, please find another thread to troll.

Thanks

Ok.... are you asking which round is best for obstinant elderly moms?

Sounds like you have two choices.

Take away her decision-making ability (some kind of court declaration of incompetence) and manage her finances for her.

Or - resign yourself to the risk that she MIGHT screw up her finances, and will either be living at your house eventually, or you will have to pay for a home for her.



Unfortunately, if it's HER money and she is competent, it's not really any of your business if she makes smart or dumb choices.  Nothing is more frustrating than watching people you love make dumb choices, but you cannot FORCE people to be reasonable if they don't want to be.



I'm not really in the same situation, since my parents are somewhat well off (and have a really good retirement).  In fact, I actually continually encourage them to spend more money, because I don't want to fight with my asshole brother over any inheritance.